Elephants in the Room

As members of the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum's curatorial and education teams, we have been working for two years on strategic institutional initiatives supported fully by the Board of Trustees and senior executive leadership, with digital being at the forefront. While attending Museums and the Web last year (Chicago, 2015), we were struck by the lack of representation by the non-digital sector at museums. In order to effect lasting institutional change, digital and non-digital colleagues need to develop together a shared language, set of goals, and working methods. In our presentation, we propose to address the ways in which we, as non technologists, have experienced a dramatic shift in our roles and inter-departmental communication. Rather than standing in the way (or even halting), digital initiatives, we are actively integrating digital into our work. Christina Nielsen and Michelle Grohe will speak on the shifting landscape in curatorial and museum education practice, and address how we are moving forward together with digital colleagues and others across the Gardner Museum on a series of projects (new website, onsite digital interpretation, social media, etc.). While we were a completely digital-phobic institution three years ago, we now embrace technology across the spectrum and strive to be an exemplar of how to embed digital into our everyday activities. Speakers Session Leader : Christina Nielsen, Curator of the Collection, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Co-Presenter : Michelle Grohe, Assistant Curator of Education and School Programs, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum MCN 2016 Presenting Sponsor: Piction New Orleans, LA